70 fun facts about In-N-Out Burger in honor of its 70th birthday

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Harry and Esther Snyder opened the first In-N-Out hamburger stand across the street from their Baldwin Park house in 1948.
The site is now part of the I-10 Freeway. The Irvine-based chain is building a replica burger stand nearby in Baldwin Park.

Fans of the hamburger chain gather during the unveiling of a replica of the first In-N-Out hamburger stand in Baldwin Park on Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2014. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda/ San Gabriel Valley Tribune)

What is said to be California’s first drive through fast food stand is depicted in this In-N-Out Burger drawing which adorns the box holding the company’s cookie jar souvenir. The artist is Jack Schmitt. The Irvine-based company is constructing a replica of this original stand on Francisquito Avenue in Baldwin Park.
///ADDITIONAL INFO //// Luna.FoodNews.0605.ots — shot 5/30/13 — /// Photo by H. Lorren Au Jr., Orange County Register.
Bob Benbow is the president and curator of the local Baldwin Park Historical Society.

President Lynsi Torres of the In-N-Out hamburger chain during the unveiling of a replica of the first In-N-Out hamburger stand in Baldwin Park on Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2014. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda/ San Gabriel Valley Tribune)

ORG XMIT: CAAL205 In this June 8, 2010 photo, In-N-Out Burger signs, two in the foreground from the fast food chain’s original location, and one in the background at a new location across the Interstate 10 freeway, fill the skyline in Baldwin Park, Calif. Amid complaints of obesity and lines of idled cars stretching into neighborhood streets, this blue-collar town is banning new drive-throughs in hopes of shedding its reputation as a haven for convenient, fatty foods. (AP Photo/Adam Lau)

In-N-Out Burger CEO Lynsi Torres, right, gives 18-year employee Barbie Fowler, 70, a hug at the grand opening of the new Rancho Santa Margarita restaurant on Wednesday.
///ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: s.rc.inNout0213  2/13/13  LEONARD ORTIZ, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER   Lynsi Torres, the CEO, President, and first granddaughter to In-N-Out will be at the grand opening of the In-In-Out in Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif.. Torres, the 30-year-old was recently named the youngest female billionaire in the U.S.

In-N-Out Burger’s 30-year-old president Lynsi Torres switches gears as she focuses on her drag racing at the NHRA’s Winternationals at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona. She raced in the Super Gas class on Feb. 14. Beyond being a drag racer, she is one of the world’s youngest billionaires as owner of the popular fast food restaurant headquartered in Irvine.
///ADDITIONAL INFO //// InNOut.02xx.ots — shot 2/14/13 — ///

Drag racer Lynsi Torres, 30, does a burn out in her Super Gas class Camaro prior to competing in the Winternationals at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona on Feb. 14. The In-N-Out Burger president competed at the NHRA’s Winternationals. She is one of the world’s youngest billionaires.
///ADDITIONAL INFO //// InNOut.02xx.ots — shot 2/14/13 — ///

Lynsi Snyder, 35, Irvine
The seven-year president of Irvine-based In-N-Out increased her estimated worth by millions when she turned 35 in May and received the remaining shares of her trust. She has been in full control of the company since 2010.
(PHOTO BY JOSHUA SUDOCK, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER/SCNG)

The Double-Double, fries and a drink at In-N-Out. Photographed at The District in Tustin on Monday, June 18, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

In-N-Out Burger rarely adds new menu items. Over the last two weeks, stores began serving hot cocoa. (Nancy Luna, Orange County Register/SCNG)

An In-N-Out Burger antenna topper is on display at the Baldwin Park Historical Museum. The company has it’s roots in the city.
///ADDITIONAL INFO //// Luna.FoodNews.0605.ots — shot 5/30/13 — /// Photo by H. Lorren Au Jr., Orange County Register.
Bob Benbow is the president and curator of the local Baldwin Park Historical Society.

Alicia Lodermeier takes an order in the drive-thru lane at the newest In-N-Out Burger which just opened at the corner of Lakewood Blvd. and Carson Street in Long Beach on Thursday, Jun 28, 2018. The new restaurant is in the new Long Beach Exchange shopping center which also houses a Nordstrom Rack, Orchard Supply Hardware and other new businesses. (Photo by Scott Varley, Contributing Photographer)

In-N-Out Burger opened their newest restaurant at the corner of Lakewood Blvd. and Carson Street in Long Beach on Thursday, Jun 28, 2018. The new restaurant is in the new Long Beach Exchange shopping center which also houses a Nordstrom Rack, Orchard Supply Hardware and other new businesses. (Photo by Scott Varley, Contributing Photographer)

With a packed dining room, food was managed by a busy but efficient kitchen staff at the new In-N-Out Burger in Rialto, at Riverside Ave. at the 210 exit on Thursday, August 29, 2013. One of the entrances was blocked by Rialto Police vehicles and and many as 40 cars were in line.

In-N-Out employees listen to some brief remarks from the company’s president, Lynsi Snyder, before the 300th restaurant’s grand opening in Anaheim on Wednesday.
///ADDITIONAL INFO: Biz.InNout300.0108 – 1/7/15 – PHOTO BY JOSHUA SUDOCK, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER – In-N-Out opens it’s 300th restaurant. the location is on Ball Road in Anaheim.
Picture made at In-N-Out’s 200th restaurant, located in Anaheim, on Wednesday January 7, 2014

With a packed dining room, Michael White and his daughter Alexa, 4, don their caps at the new In-N-Out Burger in Rialto, at Riverside Ave. at the 210 exit on Thursday, August 29, 2013. White who lives across the street from the restaurant says he has been waiting a long time for this one to open, he is tired to having to drive to Fontana for his In-N-Out. One of the entrances was blocked by Rialto Police vehicles and and many as 40 cars were in line.

Newley weds Manuel Berumen and wife Danielle Berumen celebrate their wedding with a kiss as they wait for their In-N-Out cheese burgers to be made after marring at Crestmore Manor one of Riverside County parks popular wedding rental sites Sunday in Jurupa Valley, CA. August 27, 2017.
(TERRY PIERSON,THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE/SCNG)

Artist Patrick Fraser, of Venice, is one of the photographers, who’s art works will be on display at a photography art show at the Orange County Great Park on May 1. /ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: GreatParkPhotoShow.0501 – 4/28/16 Ð ED CRISOSTOMO, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER — GreatParkPhotoShow.0501 B641016095Z.1 This is related to a photography art show at Orange County Great Park. Patrick Fraser is one of the photographers in the show. He’s a Brit. He photographed a dozen In-N-Out Burgers in Orange County as a metaphor for Orange County.

Greg Galarpe, of San Diego, cosplays as an In-N-Out worker during the San Diego Comic-Con in San Diego on Saturday, July 21, 2018. (Photo by Jennifer Cappuccio Maher, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)

The late celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain called In-N-Out Burger’s Double-Double a “perfectly designed protein delivery system.”

The ground-breaking fast food chain is also a delivery system for the California dream.

That could explain why In-N-Out has achieved cult status.

The fast food chain celebrates its 70th anniversary on Monday, Oct. 22. The first location, a tiny stand, opened its doors in Baldwin Park on Oct. 22, 1948.

In-N-Out will mark the occasion by releasing its 2019 T-shirt in restaurants on Monday, according to Denny Warnick, vice president of operations. And an official party will take place Nov. 17 at the Fairplex in Pomona in partnership with Hot Rod Magazine.

In-N-Out grew at the same time as Southern California’s freeway system and suburbs and, as “California’s first drive-thru,” is a part of California’s car culture.

In-N-Out is owned by the descendants of its founders, Harry and Esther Snyder, does not franchise and maintains a strategy of slow, deliberate growth. Its current president, Lynsi Synder, recently told Forbes she doesn’t foresee opening restaurants east of Texas.

It has 334 restaurants in six states, fewer than one for every 100 of the 36,000-plus McDonald’s locations worldwide. Yet it punches above its weight and has an international reputation. In its early years, it actually beat McDonald’s with some of its innovations, such as drive-thru speaker systems.

Here are some of the highlights of In-N-Out’s 70 years.

Origins

1. Founder Harry Snyder (1913-1976) graduated from Venice High School in 1932. In the late ’70s, the musical “Grease” was shot at his alma mater, according to venicehighalumni.com.

2. Harry’s wife Esther (1920-2006) got a bachelor’s degree in zoology from Seattle Pacific University in 1947. The couple married in 1948 and moved to Baldwin Park.

3. Baldwin Park was a farm community with fields, dairies, chicken and turkey farms when the Snyders moved there.

4. The newlyweds lived near a restaurant called Johnny No-Bone Steakhouse. It inspired Snyder with its short, simple menu, according to Stacy Perman, author of “In-N-Out Burger.”

5. In-N-Out was one of California’s first drive-thru restaurants, if not the first. It is often claimed that Red’s Giant Hamburg in Springfield, Mo., was the world’s first drive-thru restaurant. It opened in 1947.

6. In-N-Out’s innovation was two-way speakers. Harry Snyder built his own system in his garage to better take orders from cars going through the drive-thru, according to a timeline on In-N-Out’s website.

8. October 1948 is also the month that Richard and Maurice McDonald shut down the original San Bernardino McDonald’s drive-in to streamline their operation and their menu. When they reopened weeks later, they were serving little more than burgers and shakes, much like In-N-Out. That transformation set the stage for McDonald’s’ future as a fast food giant.

9. Construction of the I-10 Freeway forced the Snyders to close their original stand in 1954 and rebuild nearby.

10. A replica of the original In-N-Out stands at 13766 Francisquito Ave., Baldwin Park, near the footprint of the first building. The public can visit it 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Thursday through Sunday.

In-N-Out today

11. In-N-Out’s corporate headquarters have been in Irvine since the early 1990s, but it still has a large presence on Francisquito Avenue in Baldwin Park, including a flagship restaurant, an employee training facility called In-N-Out University, a company store selling T-shirts and other merchandise, and the 1948 replica stand.

12. Two-lane drive-thrus with limited outdoor seating were the standard for In-N-Out restaurants until the chain opened its first dining room in Ontario in 1979. Nearly all stores built since then have dining rooms.

13. Drive-thru customers receive “lap mats” (same as place mats) if they tell their servers they want to enjoy their food in their cars. Harry Snyder started the practice.

14. Current president Lynsi Snyder, Harry and Esther’s granddaughter, was added to the Forbes 400 list of richest Americans with a net worth of $3 billion. At 36, she is the youngest woman on the list

15. In-N-Out has grown from strictly serving Los Angeles County to 334 stores in six states: California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Texas and Oregon. The newest restaurant opened days ago in Las Vegas.

16. Its seventh state will be Colorado, but not until at least 2020.

17. Los Angeles County has the most In-N-Out restaurants, 74, with one planned for Monterey Park. The Inland Empire follows with 33, with two planned in Upland and Eastvale. Orange County has 26, with one planned for Rancho Mission Viejo.

18. For hardcore fans, In-N-Out has a printable Road Trip Location Guide. You can check off restaurants as you visit them.

19. Customers can book Cookout Trailers for large parties, weddings and corporate events four to six months in advance. The vehicles are self-contained units with In-N-Out associates serving burgers, soft drinks and chips. The trucks can’t make fries or shakes. Service is available in Los Angeles and Orange counties, and parts of the Inland Empire and Ventura County. In-N-Out has a cost calculator on its website that shows a four-hour party for 200 people in California would cost $2,728.70.

20. You can download the In-N-Out theme song for free on the chain’s website.

The menu

21. In-N-Out takes pride in fresh ingredients, boasting on its website that it has no heat lamps, microwaves or freezers in its kitchens.

22. Milkshakes are made with real ice cream but come from soft serve machines

23. Beef comes from three facilities in Baldwin Park; Lathrop, south of Stockton; and Dallas.

25. In June, In-N-Out closed all of its Texas locations for two days because of sub-standard buns, creating a flurry of news headlines. “Breadgate,” as El Paso station KFOX called it, affected other chains as well, including Raising Cane’s. The problem was said to be an “unbalance in the yeast” by an unnamed supplier.

26. The Thousand Island-like dressing that comes on burgers is called spread, not sauce.

27. French fries are made with Kennebec potatoes, a variety that was developed in Maine and released in 1948, the same year In-N-Out opened. Potatoes are sliced in-store with potato cutters and fried in sunflower oil.

28. The Double-Double — two meat patties and two cheese slices — wasn’t added to the menu until 1963, when it cost 60 cents.

29. In late 2017, In-N-Out started serving Ghirardelli hot cocoa, its first menu addition since it started serving lemonade 15 years earlier.

30. Burgers and fries make a big dent in a person’s 2,000 calorie diet. A hamburger with no cheese and fries contain 785 calories. A Double-Double and fries contain 1,065 calories.

31. Spread accounts for about 80 calories and 9 grams of fat in a burger.

The Secret Menu

32. Although In-N-Out has a limited menu, diners have been customizing their burgers almost from the start. Common requests have been codified into what is called the secret menu, which is not posted in restaurants but known by employees.

33. In-N-Out lists six of the most popular items on its “not so secret menu” on its website. But countless websites, blogs and news stories list far more.

34. The most famous secret menu item is Animal Style. It’s a beef patty grilled with mustard and served with grilled onions, extra spread and the usual toppings.

35. Animal Style was invented in 1961. It is trademarked by In-N-Out.

36. Animal Style fries are topped with spread, grilled onions and cheese slices and heated in a toaster oven.

37. A grilled cheese sandwich is basically a burger with two slices of cheese but no patty. It’s not to be confused with a veggie burger, also called a Wish Burger, which is a hamburger bun with no patties and no cheese, just the lettuce, tomato, onion, pickle and spread.

38. PETA2, a youth program by the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals, has a web page devoted to “secret vegan options at In-N-Out Burger.” It tells vegans to avoid the buns, which it says contain cow milk protein, but has suggestions for hacking french fries.

43. Urban myths around larger burgers are grounded in reality. On Halloween 2004, a Bay Area blogger named Will Young (Whatup Willy) successfully ordered a 100X100 in Las Vegas. He was charged $97.66 for a Double-Double with 98 extra patties. Eight people ate it. In-N-Out now limits burgers to 4X4.

44. A 4X4 with animal fries and a chocolate shake will run up 2,150 calories, according to the diet app My Fitness Pal.

Merchandise

45. Company founder Harry Snyder designed the first In-N-Out T-shirt in 1975.

46. T-shirts featuring eye-popping Southern California scenes now sell for $12-$14.95 for adult sizes and $10.95 for youth sizes at the Company Store and online.

47. Collectible T-shirts from various years are usually the most popular merchandise, according to Warnick, “but our customers also tell us that they love the crew socks with our In-N-Out drink cup and shake cup designs.”

48. Double-Double board shorts for men cost $44.95.

49. The website groups pricier items into a category called Vault 48. They include a $90 longboard deck; a $50 Swarovski Key Chain with a heart-shaped locket featuring crossed palm trees; a $15 black silk tie with a crossed palm design.

50. In-N-Out offered collectible drinking glasses in the 1980s, including a tie-in with the 1984 film “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.” The glasses depicted cartoon scenes with Indy and the villainous High Priest Mola Ram performing “a terrifying Thuggee ritual.”

51. Christmas glasses with Santa and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer go for about $45 on Etsy.

52. Hard-to-find collectibles include an In-N-Out Monopoly game created for the chain’s 50th anniversary.

In-N-Out’s culture

53. In-N-Out employees wear red aprons around their waists. They were added to the uniform in 1974 and are fastened with enormous safety pins.

54. The crossed palm trees planted in In-N-Out lots and displayed on its milkshake cups were inspired by “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.” The 1963 film is essentially a 162-minute car chase to reach the palm trees, which have a fortune buried between them.

55. Harry Snyder was part owner of the Irwindale Raceway, and Lynsi Snyder is a former drag car racer.

56. The In-N-Out Burger Foundation was founded in 1984 to help abused and neglected children. Its website is ino4kids.org

58. In-N-Out paper supplies inconspicuously tell people where to find verses about trusting in God in the Bible. Examples include Proverbs 3:5 on the bottom of milkshake cups, Proverbs 24:16 on the bottom of french fry trays, and Nahum 1:7 on Double-Double wrappers.

In-N-Out in pop culture

59. In the 1998 Coen Brothers classic “The Big Lebowski,” actors John Goodman, Jeff Bridges and Steve Buscemi talk about visiting an In-N-Out in North Hollywood. They don’t go, and in a later scene they are shown eating takeout with different wrappers.

60. Public TV personality Huell Howser did an hour-long special episode of his series “California’s Gold” devoted to a tour of In-N-Out’s Baldwin Park headquarters in 2010.

61. On a 2011 episode of “The Simpsons,” Ned Flanders creates a list of places not to go that includes In-N-Out Burger along with Pinkberry and Jiffy Lube.

62. In 2016, a Lego user submitted a proposal for an In-N-Out Burger restaurant model kit to Lego Ideas, which helps decide which products get developed. The prototype featured a detailed exterior and interior, including palm trees, a potato cutter, and a staff of Minifigures. The project gathered more than 1,000 supporters but not enough to keep it alive. Lego Ideas has listed it as expired since January.

63. MTV has compiled a primer on references to In-N-Out Burger by hip-hop artists, including “Cadillac Girl” by Andre Nikatina and Dr. Dre and “Not Going Back” by Childish Gambino.

64. In-N-Out is hit with a constant barrage of hoaxes, including an internet rumor 10 years ago that it would go back to 1948 prices for its 60th anniversary. Buyer beware on Monday.

Fans

65. In her book, Perman reported that Hollywood stars discovered the original In-N-Out driving to Palm Springs in the 1950s. She wrote that pop singer Dinah Shore had car trouble in Baldwin Park and went over to the Snyders’ house to watch TV.

66. It has become trendy for stars to visit In-N-Out after awards shows or eat catered burgers at after-parties, according to People, which published an online photo gallery on the topic in January.

67. Helen Mirren was photographed in a Christian Lacroix gown biting into an In-N-Out Burger after winning an Academy Award for “The Queen” in 2007. The Oscar was sitting on the table in front of her.

68. Taylor Swift told interviewers she comforted herself after not winning Album of the Year for “Red” at the 2014 Grammy Awards by ordering In-N-Out.

69. Adele tweeted that she turned to In-N-Out after a botched Grammy performance in 2016.

Because of it though… I'm treating myself to an in n out. So maybe it was worth it.